Members of the Co-Lead research team attended the European Health Management Association (EHMA) Annual Conference in Bocconi University, Milan, Italy from 13th-15th June 2017. The conference assessed the opportunities offered by ‘Health Futures’, alongside a consideration of operational challenges. Prof Eilish McAuliffe chaired the parallel research session ‘Collective Leadership: Challenging Culture to Improve Quality and Safety’, which examined the model of distributing power within an organisational structure and including healthcare workers in the decision-making process to provide improvements in quality and patient safety. Five papers on the Co-Lead programme were presented by Dr Aoife De Brún, Marie O’Shea, Róisín O’Donovan, Dr Marie Ward (UCD) and Una Cunningham (Head of Transformation, Mater Misericordiae University Hospital) at this session.

 

Prof Eilish McAuliffe also organised and chaired a session on ‘Doctors vs Managers: Are Nurse Executives the answer?’. This session was designed to generate discussion and debate on the question: “Do nurses make good healthcare strategists and executives?”. Ireland is unique in having a senior nursing position in both the policy (Chief Nursing Officer, Department of Health) and delivery (Health Service Executive) arms of the health system. Half of the hospital group CEOs have nursing backgrounds. In addition, several nurses hold the position of Chief Operating Officer (COO) within level 4 hospitals. As a country, Ireland is therefore well placed to contribute to this debate on the nurse executive. Presentations were delivered by Mary Wynne (Director of Nursing and Midwifery Services, HSE), Mary Day (CEO, IEHG), Kay Connolly (Chief Operating Officer, St. Vincent’s University Hospital), Suzanne Dempsey (Chief Director of Nursing, Children’s Hospital Group and Honorary President IADNAM), Prof Martin McNamara (Professor of Nursing, UCD), and Barbara Mangiacavalli (President, Italian National Nurses Association). The Irish delegates also had the opportunity to visit services at the ASST Milano hospital during their time in Milan.